The lack of rainfall this year caused Cape Coral freshwater canals to drop to dangerous levels, impacting pressure and the amount of water needed to allow firefighters to protect the city in the event of fires. Residents have complained about restricting watering from two days to one but it must be safety first.
Video by Cory O'Donnell/The News-Press
Cory O'Donnell/The News-Press

Jeff Pearson, Cape Coral utilities director, hopes to get $1.11 million in state funding to plan a water pipeline that will bring water to Gator Slough in northeast Cape Coral.(Photo: David Dorsey)

Cape Coral endured a drought in late 2016 unlike any it had seen in 85 years, a quarter of a century before becoming a city.

The city’s drought, combined with its status as one of the nation’s fastest-growing cities, prompted Cape Coral Utilities Director Jeff Pearson to search for new water supply sources.

Pearson found a solution, one that requires money. About $1.1 million will be needed just to design, engineer and permit a 3.5-mile water pipeline that will be at least half a decade in the making. The pipeline’s construction and final cost will approach if not exceed $10 million by the time it’s completed in four-to-six years.

Pearson, who has been Cape Coral’s utilities director since 2011, realized an abundance of ground water at Southwest Aggregates Mining reservoir in south Charlotte County could be transported via a pipeline across U.S. 41 and to Gator Slough in northeast Cape Coral, just west of U.S. 41 and north of Del Prado Boulevard.

That water would then feed into Cape Coral’s canal system, the primary, existing source of the city’s average 20-25 million gallons of irrigation water used per day.

Cape Coral averages 12-13 million gallons of drinking water consumed per day. That water travels through a separate piping system generated from two city water plants. Expanding the irrigation water means the city does not have to spend as much money on drinking water, Pearson said.

Pearson began discussions about state funding with state Rep. Dane Eagle, who was born in Fort Myers but considers himself a Cape Coral native.

“They came to me about a year ago,” said Eagle, who could not get the money into last year’s state budget but remains hopeful for this year. “I’m reasonably confident. I’m also realistic. We’ve got a tight budget.

But water priority and water quality is one of our biggest issues.

Getting water to where it’s needed is a top priority.

“It will take time. But with the city growing exponentially, we’ve got to get to work.”
Eagle filed an appropriations bill requesting the money in state funds this month.

Buy Photo

Dane Eagle, a state representative from Cape Coral, is hoping to secure $1.11 million in state funding to plan a water pipeline in northeast Cape Coral.(Photo: Andrea Melendez/The News-Press)

“We got it through the first committee,” said Eagle, a commercial real estate broker and a Republican who is up for re-election this year. “I presented it last week, and they approved it.”

The bill must be approved by the agricultural and natural resources appropriations committee, then the full appropriations committee over the next few weeks.

“Once it’s approved, it’s going to be in the budget,” Eagle said. “So I just have to make sure it’s in the final budget sent to the governor.”

The pipeline would be the first of a long-term, three-phase project.

“Phase one would be putting in the pipeline,” Pearson said. “Phase two would be to build a dedicated pump station. Phase three would be to build a flow-way to help with the water in the Cecil Webb Wildlife Management Area. We would like to help them pump the water out of that reservoir into the aggregate mine reservoir and then pump that into the gator slew.”

For now, Pearson and Eagle are staying focused on the funding for the design of the pipeline.

Pearson explained why this would be a great fit for the city and for Charlotte County, which already signed off on Cape Coral using the reservoir. The water there is too far from Charlotte County’s water infrastructure to be of any use to the north.

“It’s an active aggregate mine,” Pearson said. “They mine for rock. They crush it to different sizes and use it for various construction projects. That mine has less than five years remaining until it can’t mine any more. There’s a large reservoir as a result of that mining operation that is full of water. It can hold a billion and a half gallons of water that can be used for other purposes. By coincidence, it’s the same amount of water storage that we can store in our canal system.”

Water flows on both sides of U.S. 41. Some of the water comes from the Cecil Webb wildlife conservation, which sometimes floods to the point of killing trees, Pearson said.

“Our ultimate goal is to help that situation and bring that water down and pump it into Cape Coral’s canals,” Pearson said. “We have a world-class system here in Cape Coral. We have two drinking water plants that are reverse osmosis. They use brackish water, that is essentially salty water, that we turn into drinking water.

“This past year, it was recognized by the AWA, the American Water Works Association, for having the best drinking water in our region. We were very happy about that. We have a separate piping system that uses exclusively irrigation water. That’s considered non-potable or non-drinking water. That can be used on your lawn and your landscaping.

That is used from 100 miles of canal water.”

In spending up to $10 million for a new pipeline, Pearson said the city could be saving millions more in having to build a third water treatment plant down the road.

“With that system, it is actually helping us to keep our rates down flat,” Pearson said. “Because we don’t have to build more drinking water plants, and drinking water plants cost a lot of money. Otherwise, we would be expanding or building more drinking water plants to satisfy that demand that outdoor, non-potable uses consume.”